DRAMA
Lower Elementary – Middle School
Take a bow! The Wellan Drama program helps students gain confidence, interpersonal skills, and public speaking experience. Through activities in improvisation, storytelling, and script analysis, they sharpen critical thinking and verbal communication skills. As they explore the wants, needs, and motivation of characters in the play, they increase their ability to empathize with others.
Curriculum
At Wellan, we believe in the inherent value of each child’s voice and want them to know what it is to be seen and heard. We also realize that speaking in front of an audience takes practice and courage—it is a skills that develops incrementally when the environment is prepared and safe. At each programmatic level, Wellan’s Drama Program helps students find, develop, and own their individual and expressive voices.
In Elementary, Drama is taught by grade level in order to keep group sizes small and give each student a chance to have the performing experience they are personally ready for. Lower Elementary students have Drama for 40 minutes once a week for half the year, and Upper Elementary students have it for the whole year.
By the time they reach the Voyager years, students not only have Drama for 40 minutes once a week, they also have additional opportunities for theater experiences through Drama Electives such as Playwriting, How to Audition, and Playing with Shakespeare. In Voyager, all students take part in a fully student led production each spring where they direct, act, design (with the teacher as a guide). The entire Voyager cohort also engages in a Drama “Deep Dive” week where students explore production-based roles beyond acting and connect stage work their their academic studies in Humanities.
Wellan also offers two after school Drama Programs: Grades 1-5 and Grades 6-8. Our middle school program is a member of METG (Massachusetts Educational Theatre Guild) and students have opportunities to attend outside workshops and participate in the Middle School Theatre Festival.